David Mellor presents the fifth of eight programmes celebrating musical personalities from the past. A New Gospel of Human Dignity and Love. Polish violinist Bronislaw Huberman saw in the Jewish settlement of Palestine not just a refuge from persecution in Europe but also an example for the world. In its image, he created the Palestine Orchestra, now the Israel Philharmonic. Jewish players flocked from Europe's orchestras, as they still do, especially from Russia. Arturo Toscanini conducted the opening concert, in December 1936, the year the orchestra's present music director Zubin Mehta was born. In this programme, he looks back on the orchestra's history and achievements. Huberman himself is heard in the finale of Tchaikovsky's Violin Concerto, and the orchestra plays music including Mahler, Dvorak and Bernstein under conductors Paul Kletzki , Istvan Kertesz , Leonard Bernstein and Zubin Mehta , and the slow movement of Brahms's Piano Concerto No 1 with Artur Rubinstein.
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